I wonder if any other ProZians can beat my record of how many different misspellings of a personal name have been used in correspondence, on credit cards etc.

My record:

First Name (Paul): PAL, POL, POUL, POOL, POU and PAU.

POOL seems to be the most common.

Surname (Dixon): DIXAN, DIXIN, DUXSAN, TIXAN and TEXAN.

All about the same in frequency.

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NancyLynnCanada Local time: 11:04Member (2002) French to English + ...

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Wow!

Dec 18, 2009

I don't think I can beat your surname switches, but my husband was christened Johnothan, so you can imagine the variety of aliases he has among his different cards... One supplier even insists on issuing invoices to Johnson's Upholstery!

His dad was christened Leonard Walter, but one ID card states Leonard Walker.

I've never had any problems myself.

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My boss recieves letters from some American NGO, beginning with "Dear Mr. Vladislavovich". That is neither his surname nor name, but patronymic (meaning his fathers name is Vladislav). I wonder what is the reason for this confusion, because his surname (Roginsky) definitely looks like surname

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Surprisingly I must admit that my rather difficult name never gets misspelled, except by myself in a hurry.
I remember one incident when still working in a research team. I had written to an American scientist and suggested a method related to a problem in image analysis. I signed my letter as usual with "Heinrich Pesch".

The person wrote me a kind answer but put on the envelope:

"Dr. Heinrich Pesch".

Of course my colleagues thought that I had been imposing the title myself. Very embarrassing indeed!

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My friends call me Lilia but my "formal" name is Evangelia. I made the mistake of not putting an "h" after "g" (Evanghelia), so almost everyone says evandjelia. Also, the stress is on LI (EvangeLIa) but this is difficult for English speakers it seems and everyone pronounces it as evanDJElia or, in the best cases, evanGHElia. Now, the second one translates as gospel (as in the Gospel of Matthew etc, because in Greek it means "good news", so basically the Apostles brought good news or wrote about good news etc). So you can imagine the nightmare every time I had to introduce myself. Because in spite of whatever I said my name was, the name was almost always mispronounced.

[Edited at 2009-12-18 07:29 GMT]

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Jan Willem van Dormolen, that's what my name is.
First name Jan Willem is two words. Dutch people are aware of Dutch males often having double names, but they tend to connect them with a hyphen (Jan-Willem). Still, it's a long name, so I get abbreviated a lot. Some people even call me JW. Foreign people usually don't get the double name bit, so I get called Jan a lot.

But then the last name. I won't even go into what foreigners make of it, although, since it looks weird to them anyway, they do surprisingly well.
But the natives:
van der Molen, van Doormolen, van Doormalen, van Oormolen, van Dormden, etc, and then each of these without the van bit.
I'm usually very surprised when someone gets in right in one go...

According to a new site that meticulously archives all Dutch surnames, there are actually only 104 people in the Netherlands with my surname. Maybe that's got something to do with it?

[Bijgewerkt op 2009-12-18 08:07 GMT]

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Though I have seen my surname (Doughty) written as Doherty and Docherty. But it has been pronounced as both these, also Duffty and Dorty.
The one I always remember was way back in 1957. I was in the Lost Property Office at Paddington station asking about something I had left on a train. I told the man the other side of the desk my name was Doughty, and he replied: "Oh, you mean DIRTY!"

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Though I have seen my surname (Doughty) written as Doherty and Docherty. But it has been pronounced as both these, also Duffty and Dorty.
The one I always remember was way back in 1957. I was in the Lost Property Office at Paddington station asking about something I had left on a train. I told the man the other side of the desk my name was Doughty, and he replied: "Oh, you mean DIRTY!"

So, Jack, how should your name be pronounced? Is it DOWTY, as in NOW? Or DORTY as in OUGHT? Or DOFFTY as in OFF? Just curious!
As for myself, yes, my surname is now FORBES which is not an uncommon name, but I still have to spell it out for people because otherwise they insist on calling me FORD. And my maiden name was more unusual - ORDISH. Spelt exactly as pronounced, but people usually insisted on something like AUDISH - why?? And my father sometimes got called ODDISH, OLDISH and even BALDISH, which was particularly wounding as he went bald rather young.
Then there's my first name, CARON, which I never use and which, I'm told, my father dreamed up at the font. This causes the greatest difficulty because one is expected "dans les pays anglo-saxones" to use one's first name. Problematical here because everyone insists on KAREN and I have to give the font explanation every time. Wearying ...
Parents should take great care when naming their children, don't you think? Even consider the initials - they might spell something comic or demeaning.
Best wishes,
Jenny - a nice, simple name, hooray!

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which could be translated into Russian as "смелый", pronounced "Smelly". That goes quite well with "Dirty", doesn't it?

I was pronouncing like dough-ty:)

My name AND surname are always endless for of amusement.
In the UK Andrea is a female name, while in Italy is male, but despite the spelling stays the same (the pronunciation in the UK varies as the stress can go either on the first or second syllable, in my case the second) I always have to spell it out a couple of times as Brits find it difficult to accept that I am called with (what they see as) a female name
However, my my simple surname is the best bit. It hardly ever gets spelled right: ree, rae, rea, rex (that was a courier company, they couldn't come with a 2 letter surname, so they gave me a bonus "x"), rey, ray and so on and so forth; when I spell it and than pause at the end, the other person pauses as well waiting for the remaining letters to be spelled... it works every time:)

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Angela DicksonUnited Kingdom Local time: 15:04 French to English + ...

Ha!

Dec 18, 2009

Paul Dixon wrote:

Surname (Dixon): DIXAN, DIXIN, DUXSAN, TIXAN and TEXAN.

I've never had any of these, though I see my name written like yours all the time (as it's also the name of a well-known chain of electronics stores here). I get Dickinson a lot, especially from telephone cold-callers - I just say "no-one of that name here" and hang up.

When I got married there was a sign in front of the place where the reception was held, so people would know they were in the right place. It was meant to say "Wedding Reception for [my name] and [his name]".

I don't know who wrote the sign, but they managed to spell everything incorrectly apart from "Wedding", "For" and my husband's first name.

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My name (Gabrielle) is the feminine version of Gabriel, but people sometimes think I'm a man... which led to problems when working as a healthcare assistant for an agency, who didn't realise the home they sent me to needed a man and thought I was one!
Marcellus-Temple always gets pronounced with a soft c, instead of a hard c, but I've really given up on correcting that...
My personal favourite, though, is a letter my husband (Dominic Marcellus-Temple) once received from the council - it was addressed to 'Demonic Temple'!

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